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Vettel: My 2019 F1 season isn't similar to '14 Red Bull struggles

Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel does not believe his 2019 Formula 1 season is similar to his final Red Bull campaign in '14

Five years ago, Vettel endured a frustrating season with Red Bull as it struggled with Renault's first effort in the turbo-hybrid era, while team-mate Daniel Ricciardo outperformed him.

How a Red Bull-era weakness is still plaguing Vettel

Vettel moved on at the end of the year to join Ferrari as a replacement for Fernando Alonso and has regularly been in title contention during his time at the Scuderia.

But Vettel's defeats to Hamilton in the title race have been followed up by a difficult 2019 in which he has made multiple errors and faced strong opposition from new team-mate Charles Leclerc.

When asked by Autosport whether he felt the frustrations of 2019 reminded him of '14, Vettel said: "No not really.

"Firstly, that was a long time ago and secondly, this is very different.

"When you're talking about the frustrations I think it's maybe here and there [as it's] the end result that's missing.

"I think in terms of the races we've had, they could have gone the other way as well so I think we need to be fair and not be judging one particular lap [such as his clash with Max Verstappen in the British GP].

"But it happened and the laps up to that point were quite strong. We started sixth [at Silverstone] so not by chance found ourselves third at some point.

"The safety car, you could argue helped, but we managed quite well in the first stint doing something different to other people and making it work.

"I think other races could have been different as well so I'm not too worried, but I know that I can have better results come Sunday. I'm looking forward to Germany now."

Vettel's rival Lewis Hamilton believes the Ferrari driver will bounce back from his current form.

The Ferrari driver lies fourth in the drivers' standings and trails championship leader Hamilton by 100 points and has scored just four podiums in the 10 races to date.

"I absolutely believe that he'll rebound," he said. "You look at the greats playing tennis, he's one of those. He's had a difficult race today, but he's a four-time world champion.

"He will recover and redeem himself if he feels he needs to, and he will come back strong in the next race. That's what great athletes do."

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